Looking for Running Watch

[elizabeth234]

Hey everyone!
I am looking for recommendations for the best fitness watch to help me track my workouts, health stats, and daily activity. My main priorities are accurate heart rate monitoring, reliable GPS, good battery life, and a comfortable design which suitable for all-day wear. I’d also love something that tracks sleep, supports multiple workout types, and syncs easily with my phone. My budget is around $150–$800, but I am open to going higher if there’s a clear upgrade in features or accuracy. I have been checking out options from Garmin, Fitbit, Samsung, and Apple. But I am open to other brands if they offer better value. If you have been using one that you love (or hate), I would really appreciate hearing about your experience, especially in terms of accuracy, durability, and ease of use.
Thanks in advance!

 

[rungirl]

I've been using the Garmin Forerunner 55 for about 2 1/2 years and am happy with it. It syncs to the Garmin app, which I believe all the Garmin GPS watches do. It supports running, walking, and biking and a few other things. It tracks heartrate (although it's hard for me to say how accurate that is) and will show sleep data if you wear it at night. I generally don't sleep with a watch but I have a few times with this watch just to look at the data.

One of my main criteria when I chose it was comfort. I have a small wrist and most GPS watch faces are uncomfortably large for me. This one fits well and the strap is soft and comfortable. I only wear it for running or occasionally if I go for a long walk. The GPS is reliable and battery lasts over a week when I just use it for running. Also, I wanted a basic GPS watch mostly for time, distance, pace when running; I would just get overwhelmed with data with some of the higher-end models. As it is, even this watch does more than I use it for.

My biggest complaint is that I've never been able to figure out how to see time of day during an active run. It might be configurable, but I haven't found it.

If you want to research lots of GPS watches, a really good website is DC Rainmaker: https://www.dcrainmaker.com/

 

[adlgel]

I have used the Apple Watch for years now. I purchased a refurbished Series 7 watch from Apple directly last year. At the time that I purchased it the Series 9 had just come out but I didn't think the new features were worth it to me to pay the higher price. The Series 10 is now out. I wear this watch all day, every day but do not sleep in it.

What I love about it:
1. Ability to interchange watch straps - I use the silicone strap that came with the watch anytime I am doing a serious workout. But I have two other "fashion" straps that I interchange sometimes daily - a white silicone with gold trim band from Michele and a gold-tone band from Kate Spade.
2. Interoperability with my Apple iPhone - all of my workout data syncs automatically to the Apple fitness app on my watch.
3. Workout options - I've used walking and running (they both have indoor and outdoor versions), strength training, high intensity interval training, biking (indoor and outdoor), swimming, elliptical, etc.
4. Plethora of health data available - I thought it was so cool to see how my heart rate spiked when watching the football team I root for win the Super Bowl for the first time during my lifetime. But there is so much more available.

What's cool but I don't use it that much:
1. Ability to send and receive text via the watch
2. Ability to answer phone calls via the watch

What I don't like about it:
1. As I said I wear this as my everyday watch - to work, out to dinner, etc. While I can be bothered to change out my watch band, apparently I can't be bothered to get a "real" watch. And the aesthetics of the Apple watch certainly leave something to be desired, even with a nice band. But I think that is honestly just the nature of wearing a sport watch and with a nice band I think the Apple Watch looks loads better than a Garmin or other sport watch.
2. My husband recently got an Apple Watch for when he runs which he does 2-4 times per week. He didn't like the way that you needed to pause/resume a run mid-workout by swiping across the face of the watch and hitting the pause button. I never had a problem with it. But he then found you could engage the pause/resume function by hitting the crown and the other button on the side of the watch simultaneously.